By Jacqueline Dooley
Every Sunday morning, I get an e-mail newsletter filled with job openings in the media industry. I’ve been receiving this newsletter for at least four years, and each year I’ve used it differently.
During my first year in business, I used the newsletter to actively seek employment. I often sent introductory e-mails offering myself up as a source of interim talent to the companies seeking to hire full-time employees. My feeling was that even part-time, freelance help was better than no help at all.
Even though I no longer need to troll the listings, I continue to receive the newsletter. Now I use it to gauge the health of the industry, and evaluate the types of jobs out there.
One of the things that catches my eye among the listings is the phrase, “permanent position.” I wonder what permanent means these days?
Oh, I’m jaded, I fully admit that. I’ll never be able to trust the permanence of any “permanent” position again based on living through the layoffs that occurred at the agency where I worked from 1997 to 2002. Not only did I witness at least six rounds of layoffs during my tenure with that company, I eventually ended up on the chopping block.
It was hard to believe that’s how the story ended back then. Getting laid off from a position that, in 1997, had unlimited potential for growth was not only shocking, it was a huge eye opener. I think my own naivete was a big reason for my blind faith in the permanence of my job back then. My father has been employed with the same company for more than 30 years, after all. I saw no reason for my own career path to be any different.
Yet I’ve always felt a nagging uncertainty about being dependent on one company for my complete financial security for an indefinite amount of time.
Not sure it can be done
These days I often wonder if it’s possible to be permanently self-employed. How long can I go on running my own business, which is paradoxically dependent on the viability and success of other businesses - and their ongoing need for talent - until the day I fold up my computer and retire to a hammock in the Bahamas?
I’ve asked that question a lot lately, and the answer is always - well, forever. But my husband has pointed out on more than one occasion that we have no safety net like we would if I was an employee for one company.
When you’re self-employed, you are not covered by unemployment. There are no severance packages, or COBRA benefits. The money just stops until you can find a way to start it up again.
Now my financial stability must be independent from job permanence. My business is the path to that reality - I truly believe that - but only if I plan it properly and don’t ignore things like IRA contributions and supplementary long-term disability insurance even though they nibble away at my immediate income.
Planning for contingencies so my family is covered if the money stops coming in is part of what I have to consider to keep this well-oiled machine running. If I don’t take the time to plan ahead now, then I may as well start sending out resumés again.
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This article was originally published in the Poughkeepsie Journal under the title, “Job security is just a wish for most self-employers” (a title I hate) on Saturday, February 17, 2007.
By Jacqueline Dooley
Last week I got a rare glimpse of myself, as I was two years ago, from the perspective of an old friend. I last saw my friend in mid-2005 when she stayed with me for a few days and really got to “look under the hood” of my life. I didn’t hear from her again until this past weekend.
What she finally told me about that visit made me realize how difficult it was to start up a home business, and how much I have learned over the past couple of years.
I’d already been self-employed for over two years in the summer of 2005, but I hadn’t put any effort into my business for the last few months of 2003 and throughout all of 2004. There was a good reason for this - I was pregnant in late 2003/early 2004 and I learned that my baby would be born with a severe facial birth defect – cleft lip and palate.
During the entire first year of my daughter’s life, I was devoted to her care. I worked part-time so I could spend one day a week, each week, for six months taking my baby to New York University’s Institute of Reconstructive Plastic Surgery to have her face molded and shaped in preparation for her first surgery.
I spent the next six months preparing her for, and then helping her recover from, the two major surgeries she had to repair her lip, gums, nose and palate.
It wasn’t until the end of April 2005, when she was fully recovered from extensive reconstruction of her palate, that I sat down with my husband and we made the collective decision that I needed to start working full-time. We were completely broke from medical bills and my own lack of work.
So the summer of 2005 (when my friend visited) found me highly irritable and emotional for a number of reasons. I can’t underestimate the amount of stress I was under back then. I missed my kids because I was working so much, but I had no time for myself because the kids, the house, and my husband all needed me.
Visible Strain
I was sleep-deprived and angry all the time, I felt guilty when I wasn’t with my girls, but guilty when I wasn’t working. I lashed out at everyone, and felt guilty for that too.
I can only imagine the impression I must’ve made on my friend. It’s no wonder she got a little worried about how much I was taking on, and how I seemed to yell at my kids a little too much.
I can’t believe I’d forgotten how hard that summer was.
The anniversary of my daughter’s second surgery and her third birthday both fall in April. April also marks two full years from the moment I made the decision to put everything I could into my business and try to make a better life for myself and my family.
I didn’t realize how much of myself I put into my business two years ago to create something that I’ve become proud of, and has enabled me to finally realize some of my life long dreams. I’d forgotten how hard it can be, when you’re at the end of one hard journey and at the beginning of another. So, while it hurts to see myself as I was, albeit through someone else’s eyes, I’m grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to appreciate just how far I’ve come.
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This article was published in the Poughkeepsie Journal on February 10, 2007 under the title, “Friend’s visit recalls rough road.”
By Jacqueline Dooley
No matter how many hours I spend in the office, I almost never find it difficult to leave the trappings of full-time employment and step into the role of mom at the end of the day or week.
Perhaps it’s because I never truly relinquish that role while I’m at work. My first priority is my children. My first thought when I leave them is about how happy I’ll be to see them when the day is done.
So it seems ironic that I spend a lot of time talking and thinking about work while I’m with my kids. I think this contradiction lies with the fact I want to be accepted by parents and professionals as an equally invested member of both groups.
When I speak with clients or prospective clients, I feel compelled to let them know I am a mother. Whether it’s a quick mention of picking my daughter up for kindergarten, or apologizing for the occasional loud shrieks from my 2-year-old as she plays downstairs with my husband, I rarely start a relationship with a client without making it clear I have children.
The same is true with regard to work when I’m in a social situation with other parents. This weekend, for example, I was at a birthday party filled with people who didn’t know me. My 5-year-old ran off to play but my 2-year-old stuck to me like glue.
Be proud
At one point I was chatting with another parent over a bowl of chips. I asked him what he did for a living, we talked about his job for a few minutes and then there was one of those awkward pauses that so frequently occur when meeting new people. I waited for him to ask me about my job. He didn’t. He looked at my 2-year-old and said, “So I guess she gets you out and about a lot, right?”
I could’ve acquiesced at that point and moved on. After all, she does get me out and about a lot and here was an opportunity to be 100 percent mom in a setting where that was completely acceptable.
Instead, I smiled, explained I was self-employed as a full-time marketing consultant, dropped the names of several of my well-known clients and threw in the fact I wrote a weekly column for the Poughkeepsie Journal. It felt great to say all those things and be proud of it.
It’s definitely easier to admit to myself and others that I miss my children when I’m not with them. But to admit enjoy working and running my own business, and contributing to the financial growth of my family is much harder.
But the truth is that while I’ve built a business out of my home so I can be closer to my children, I’d be lying to myself if I didn’t admit that my business is all about me and the way I prefer to work.
At the end of the day, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to admit I spend my days doing what I love to do, and that sometimes it’s hard to table that even when I’m spending time with the people I love most in the world.
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This article was published in the Poughkeepsie Journal on Saturday, February 3, 2007 under the title, No Need to Apologize for Work at Home.”
